Sunday, January 24, 2016

"In a city where new cultures constantly bump up against each other, Miami is a city that shows there are still some strengths to becoming a mixing pot. Chuck Todd reports from his hometown of Miami, a city where the future can always be re-invented."

Friday, January 22, 2016

In just three days, Anjali Ramkissoon has gone from an anonymous fourth-year neurology resident with Jackson Health System, to an Internet sensation because of the video below that shows her fighting with an Uber driver in the Brickell area of Miami.

Juan Cinco, the YouTube user who uploaded the video describes what happened:

This Uber driver deserves a bonus from the company (and a medal for having self-restraint while dealing with this animal). I know everyone has their bad days, or drunk moments, but this was over the top (I thought I knew what psycho was until i experienced this).
[Sunday night in Miami, Fl (Mary Brickell Village)]
We were on the phone with this uber driver while he pulled up to our location. Out of nowhere the girl in the video gets in the backseat of his car and won't get out. We told the driver it was ok, to just cancel our ride, but he did not want to take her anywhere so he kept telling her to get out.
Eventually the driver gets out and says he's calling the cops to get her out of the car. After a couple of minutes of the driver pretending to talk to the cops (im assuming he was pretending because they never showed up at first), the girl decides to reach into the front seat, grab his keys, and start walking away with his keys in her hands.... That's where the video starts...
The police finally showed up after this video ends. The girl was in a taxi cab about to leave when the showed up and they had to stand in front of the taxi and tell him to stop. The girl eventually got up from the area the cops had told her to sit and wait, and tried to walk away from the scene.
Once in handcuffs, she then tried kicking some of the police officers on the scene. It was only when they put her in the police car that she started crying, apologizing, and claiming that she would lose her medical license (she claimed to be a neurologist) if she got arrested.

As of Friday afternoon, the video has racked up more than 1,600,000 views and Ramkissoon has been suspended from her duties at Jackson.

Click this and images below to enlarge.

Well, maybe if the doctor thing doesn't work out, she can always get a job as an Internet model.

However, I'd like to humbly suggest that your time would be better spent watching Southern Living Magazine's Whitney Wright demonstrating how to make fool-proof buttermilk biscuits that are perfect for any Sunday dinner. Enjoy!

There was one strange incident reported — but it came long before the bikes and ATVs took to the road and was far away from Broward County, where most of the riders ended up Monday.
On Sunday, Doral police arrested an out-of-town dirt bike rider they believe was here to take part in Monday’s ride. Though his name wasn’t available Monday, police said the man was driving opposite traffic on several city streets and was charged with reckless driving after police caught up to him in the parking lot of the Miami Herald.

Butsomewhere along the line, a caption writer decided to change "reckless driving" into the much more serious charge of "wreckless driving."

Thursday, January 14, 2016

What could be cuter than a bunch teen girls singing a catchy ditty about a presidential candidate that some have compared to history's most vile dictators?

That unlikely scenario took place last night in Pensacola when a group of young girls known as the USA Freedom Kids took to the stage before an appearance by Donald Trump.

Now, get ready to tap your feet and sing along with the "Kids":

"Freedom's Call"

Cowardice
Are you serious?
Apologies for freedom, I can’t handle this.
When freedom rings, answer the call!
On your feet, stand up tall!
Freedom's on our shoulders, USA!
Enemies of freedom face the music, c'mon boys, take them down
President Donald Trump knows how to make America great
Deal from strength or get crushed every time

According to the Daily Beast, "Manager Jeff Popick said the girls, including his daughter, like Trump because he ‘makes them feel very safe.’”

This particular track has been in the works for nearly a year. And, when the original lyrics were penned, it was General George Patton who was named in the lyrics. But when Jeff Popick, the group’s manager, watched Donald Trump announce his presidential candidacy and declare “I will find the General Patton …,” it inspired Popick to rewrite the lyrics and make it more relevant and contemporary.

Take long time Beach resident Mitch Novick, for instance. Novick is pissed.

He's the owner of the Sherbrooke Hotel at 9th Street and Collins Ave. He's been at that location since 1992.

On his YouTube page where he posts videos of the comings and goings on his block, Novick complains that his neighborhood "has become a cesspool of humanity."

In a commentary attached to his latest video (below) posted just a few days ago, Novick writes:

From my home, I have witnessed drug deals, prostitution, public inebriation, defecation, and urination, stabbings which precipitated murder, sexual assaults, robberies (up 35% this past year), and the list goes on and on.
The MB Police Department have visited me regularly to view my CCTV public right of way footage which has assisted in the arrest and conviction of hardened criminals. I also have little doubt that the problems which plague Washington Avenue along the districts western boundary, are causally related to the nearby MXE zoning district which spans from 5th to 16th Street along Ocean Drive and Collins Avenue.
The area is congested with all kinds of riff-raff, it’s dirty, dangerous, loud, and the vacancy factor has skyrocketed. The three streets are saturated with tee shirt shops, 7-elevens, pizza joints, liquor stores, tattoo parlors and smoke shops.
Due to the continued degradation of the neighborhood, this past year we’ve seen the departure of national tenants including: Barney’s Co-op, Urban Outfitters, Benetton, Kenneth Cole, Ralph Lauren and just recently, Levi’s announced it too, will be leaving. As a hotelier, I can attest that international tourists are also finding safer destinations to spend their dollars.

Novick told me today that he believes a majority of the problems along Ocean Drive and the adjacent entertainment district can be alleviated by requiring businesses to "contain or substantially reduce their noise levels."

Coincidentally, in a letter sent yesterday to the Mayor and City Commissioners, City Manager Jimmy Morales wrote, "major crime along Ocean Drive decreased by 19.6% in 2015, with a 2.15% reduction in violent crime and a 21.82% reduction in non-violent/property crime." (The report is embedded below)

But as Mark Twain once wrote, "There are lies, damned lies and statistics."

"Do [we] really want Miami Beach to be like the rest of Florida?" Munzenrieder asked.

Yes, [Ocean Drive] has come a long way since the Cocaine Cowboys era, but let's not try to turn the scene of the Scarface chainsaw massacre into Rodeo Drive.

So sure, Ocean Drive might need some updates and changes, but trying to erase its history won't get us anywhere. We can't pick and choose what kind of tourists visit Miami Beach and what they do while here. Who are we, Donald Trump? Is Miami Beach going to build a wall on the MacArthur Causeway and make sure tourists are "refined" and "classy" before being allowed in?

Ocean Drive is what it is and what it always will be, and anyone thinking it can be turned into some generic Florida beachside is fooling themselves.

Federal authorities on Wednesday announced a temporary, anti-money laundering crackdown on pricey homes bought secretly with cash in Miami-Dade County and New York City.

The new policy will require title insurance companies to identify the owners of shell companies that pay $1 million or more in cash for homes in Miami-Dade and $3 million or more for homes in New York City and report their names to the federal government.

The move reflects concerns that dirty money from abroad is helping fuel the local residential real estate boom. Wealthy buyers in South Florida often use a network of domestic and offshore companies to prevent their names becoming public. Using a limited liability company to buy property also offers owners legal benefits such as liability protection.

Concerned about illicit money flowing into luxury real estate, the Treasury Department said Wednesday that it would begin identifying and tracking secret buyers of high-end properties.

The initiative will start in two of the nation’s major destinations for global wealth: Manhattan and Miami-Dade County. It will shine a light on the darkest corner of the real estate market: all-cash purchases made by shell companies that often shield purchasers’ identities.

It is the first time the federal government has required real estate companies to disclose names behind all-cash transactions, and it is likely to send shudders through the real estate industry, which has benefited enormously in recent years from a building boom increasingly dependent on wealthy, secretive buyers.

Monday, January 11, 2016

"On Miami Vice, cop show meets music video meets car commercial. The camera has switchblade jitters, the music is hot and hard, the art cool as mercury—murder made aesthetic." —New York Magazine, Feb 25, 1985.

“Miami Vice changed not only the way people looked at television, but also the way they looked at Miami and Miami looked at itself."—Stephen Sanders, author of "Miami Vice"

"It was a compressed reality, too -- from Arquitectonica's Pink House in Miami Shores, to the steel and glass towers of Brickell, to a post-modernist dreamhouse on Indian Creek island, to SoBe. (Which in '84 was merely South Beach -- where folks feared to tread. Nightclubs? Restaurants? You're dreamin', pal.) The car-chase in-an-instant was an hour-commute in real life. Mann took the one-tenth kernel of Art Deco/post-modernist truth, and edited it to make it seem the whole burgh looked this way. Eventually, more of it did."—Steve Sonsky, Miami Herald, May 21, 1989.

____________

Miami Vice lasted just five seasons on TV, but its impact on television and the city that hosted it is indisputable.

But by 1987, the Herald's Carl Hiaasen was writing, "Judging by the ratings, I might be one of the few persons in the country to loyally watch all 24 episodes this season. However, as was true last year, I admit to taping some of these shows and relying desperately on the fast-forward button to view them."

In a 1989 Miami Herald article, TV critic Steve Sonsky summed up Vice's first and second seasons: "In that first year, Vice was struggling in the ratings....The show ended that first season ranked 47th but during summer reruns, it moved into the top 10 -- and stayed there through season two, which began with another media blitz: the covers of People, Us, TV Guide, Rolling Stone again, even Time."

But season four's ratings were dismal. "Down to number 44 among network shows," Sonsky wrote.

In 1987, Johnson had decided he'd had enough of Miami, telling USA Today that despite all the good Miami Vice had done for the city's image, "We've been maligned and abused in the press and misused by politicians and other special interest groups."

Johnson's sharpest criticism was directed at The Miami Herald. He said the newspaper's handling of the Gary Hart sex scandal was one of the reasons he chose to sell his 1.84-acre property on Star Island, which he bought for $800,000 and recently sold for $1.39 million."I decided right then that I didn't want to live in a town where there was a newspaper that irresponsible . . . . I just found its tactics to be too tabloid-esque," Johnson said.

In a 1989 obit for the show, the AP's Jerry Buck wrote that despite a splashy debut, "the glitz soon wore off. After the first year, the stories became mere excuses for Crockett and Tubbs to tool around in nighttime Miami as the lights bounced off their Ferrari or as backdrops for the fashion show. [...] In the final season, at the insistence of NBC, the scripts were improved, but the ratings continued to slip."

Reality was much more intriguing, he said in an interview this month. The vision of a sexy, edgy, full-throttle Miami started with a 1982 article he read in the Wall Street Journal that contained an astounding bit of information: A full 20 percent of all unreported income in the United States came from Miami-Dade County.

Yerkovich, who wrote the pilot episode, a two-hour NBC movie that aired 12 days before the series started on Sept.28, said he thought “that must be a misprint.”

He did the math. “That means one-half of 1percent of the nation’s population is responsible for 20 percent of the under-the-table money. That is fascinating. Statistically, that’s a 40-to-1 disparity. Any area that generates 40 times more unreported cash than the rest of the country is worth writing about.”

Federal forfeiture laws allowing the government to confiscate property used in crimes offered him the opening he needed to write about a pair of cops with access to Ferraris, cigarette boats, Versace suits, Hugo Boss shoes and Rolex watches. “And whatever other toys they needed to pass as high- level players in Miami criminal circles,” he said.

The final factor? MTV. “I wanted to take the story I was visualizing and set it to music.”

LOS ANGELES - One of the technical breakthroughs planned for television as it moves toward the 21st century is the regular broadcasting of TV programs in stereo sound. And one of the first dramatic shows to move into this area is ''Miami Vice,'' a new police melodrama being produced by Universal Television for airing on NBC on Friday evenings beginning this fall.

Both the two-hour pilot and the first 12 episodes are being filmed in four- track stereo, in an experiment that is expected to point the way forward for future television shows. Yet the producers of this series find that they may have been a bit premature in embracing this technical revolution before it has actually arrived.

Within the next year or two, new technology is expected to be available that will facilitate this development: Television sets will have built-in stereo speakers. For the moment, however, TV shows filmed in stereo must depend on FM radio stations to cooperate and simulcast the programs in stereo sound. And this has proved to be a somewhat more knotty problem than the makers of ''Miami Vice'' anticipated.

Michael Levine, NBC program executive in charge of the show, remarked: ''Except for filmed concerts, stereo simulcasting is not that appealing to radio stations. We're trying to tell them that 'Miami Vice' has a lot of contemporary music. But Friday night is a hot listening night, and they're reluctant to turn over an hour to us. It will really depend on the individual market. We are trying to make it happen, but it requires a tremendous amount of coordination.''
[...]
After spending three years as writer and producer of ''Hill Street Blues,'' [co-executive producer, Anthony] Yerkovich had hoped to concentrate on feature films when he left that series. But he was attracted to ''Miami Vice'' by the opportunity to do a gritty, off-beat police show. He was interested in exploring the contemporary criminal underworld of south Florida - the same milieu dramatized in the recent remake of ''Scarface.'' ''I read a statistic that said one-third of the illegal revenues in the United States came out of south Florida,'' he said. ''I wanted to explore the changes in a city that used to be a middle-class vacation land. Today Miami is like an American Casablanca, and it's never really been seen on television.''

__________

Miami Herald, Sept. 16, 1984: Tonight, America tunes in to Miami

by Steve Sonsky,
Miami Herald Television writer

Tonight, on Miami Vice:

You will see some of the most graceful, most cinematically slick scenes ever done for television. Watch for the sequence near the end, when the heroes of the show, undercover cops Sonny Crockett and Ricardo Tubbs, pull up in their black Ferrari to a luminescent phone booth that glows in the dark of night, and the skyline is a hazy beacon, and the silvery dust flies, and the car shines, and a neon sign casts a red and blue haze. It's as pretty as a painting.

On the other hand, tonight you will also see 10 people blown away in simulated violence that, though toned down by NBC censors, still paints as bloody a mood as any show on the tube; it's there in the name of "realism" for a series that purports to illustrate what the seedy world of the vice beat is really like.

Says Michael Mann, executive producer of Miami Vice: "How graphic we get is a function of whether it has dramatic integrity. Our yardstick is, 'Is it real?' "

You will also be party tonight to a show that is a pioneer in its use of sight and sound. It utilizes, at no small expense to NBC for the rights, actual hit songs by the original artists (Cyndi Lauper, the Rolling Stones, Phil Collins), and it incorporates them into dreamy, sometimes near-surrealistic scenes. In most cases, the long, dialogue-free, music-video- style visuals weave seamlessly into the fabric of the plot. (NBC originally planned to simulcast the show on FM radio, but that fell through.)

On the other hand, at some time tonight, you may feel yourself the unlucky, bored party to a show that perhaps tries to be too innovative, whose MTV-ish interludes in some cases hinder the flow of a sophisticated plot line.

Also tonight, the cities of Miami and Miami Beach are made to seem a multicultural metropolis of pastel colors, aquatic beauty and vibrant nightlife; they have never looked better.

And again, on the other hand, there are scenes that imply that our town is an armed camp; bars on the windows of suburban homes are one touch, another is an absurdly overstated scene that shows everyone in a courtroom, from the judge to the bailiff, packing a rod for protection.

And then there is dialogue like this between two female vice cops, returning from the ladies room in a hip restaurant frequented by the drug kingpins they're pursuing. First lady cop: "It was a regular Hoover convention in there. Six legs to a stall." Second woman: "I guess that's why they call it the powder room."

Somewhere in Kansas, someone will cancel a vacation thinking that's what all of Miami is like.

I got stopped for speeding on Collins Avenue. The cop says, 'Where are you going?' I say, 'The production office of Miami Vice.' He says, 'Oh, you work on Miami Vice?' I say, 'Yeah, I'm the executive producer.' He says, 'Oh, I got a great story for you.' He forgets all about writing me a ticket, he gives me a great story and I use it." Michael Mann laughs. He goes on: "This show is a ball. It's absolutely a blast. I mean, how else do you get to tell twenty-two stories a year? Or hear a song like 'Smuggler's Blues' on the radio and say, 'Wow, those lyrics are fantastic. Let's do an episode on it.' Think, Who knows this shit better than anybody? Mikey -- you know, Miguel Piñero [the ex-convict who wrote Short Eyes]. Get him to write a script, have lunch with Glenn Frey two days later and ask him if he wants to play Jimmy, the pilot. Bang, it's on the air in four weeks."

Miami Vice is the NBC series that is blowing standard television out of the water. It's the show that keeps people who usually don't watch TV at home with their phones off the hook on Friday nights. Don Johnson and Philip Michael Thomas play two sexy, funky detectives, Sonny Crockett and Ricardo Tubbs, who ride around in a black Ferrari Daytona, picking off the master drug and flesh peddlers of southern Florida. Since they're undercover in such a slick crowd, they can't afford to be slouches in the clothes department Tubbs wears $800 Verri Uomo double-breasted suits and dark silk shirts with narrow Italian ties. Sonny has a gold Rolex and carries a Bren 10-mm semiautomatic pistol, a gun so new it is considered experimental by most special-weapons teams. The show's story line is not that unusual; it's standard shoot-'em-up cop fare. But there are differences that are immediately apparent.

Johnson and Thomas have a quirky individualism more often seen in movie stars than in television actors, and their show looks more like a motion picture than TV. The design scheme is a juxtaposition of flashy high tech (cars, guns, chrome interiors) with the pastel colors and art deco lines of the restored South Beach area of Miami. In one scene from the pilot episode, following a long shot of Crockett and Tubbs in the Ferrari, the car rolls to a stop under an arching pink and blue neon sign that reads Bernay's Cafe. Beneath the sign is alone, lit telephone booth. Everything else is blacked out. Sonny gets out of the car and steps to the phone. Edward Hopper in Miami.

As expensive as the show is to produce (it is one of TV's priciest, at a more than $1 million per episode), Miami Vice is reaping commercial rewards as well as critical acclaim. Syndication rights have been sold to Canada, Australia and the BBC. The two-hour pilot will be released as a feature film in Europe. And the ratings, only modest at first -- as were those of NBC's two other hits, Hill Street Blues and St. Elsewhere -- would take off if the show found a better time slot. But even airing on Friday night, when most of its potential audience is out of the house, Miami Vice has consistently between Matt Houston in local ratings and on several occasions topped the reigning Falcon Crest. The fact that Miami Vice can do that, despite the weekend activities of its young urban audience, is testament to its potential for success. Mike Levine, NBC's director of current drama programs, says that the network is overjoyed with the show's performance. In a highly unusual move, NBC announced the series' renewal on the air after the February 8th episode.

Don Johnson, the Miami Vice detective who made the 5 o'clock shadow stylish, has bought two lots on the Miami Beach island known for luring such eccentrics as the pot-smoking Coptics and an Arab sheik who skipped town, leaving his island palace unfinished.

The Johnson estate, to be designed by the also trend- setting Miami firm Arquitectonica, is across the street from sheik Mohammed al-Fassi's old place.

Some of Johnson's neighbors-to-be weren't surprised. They've known the star was shopping around.

One of them has never seen the TV show. He doesn't even own a TV.

"I don't know anything about him, except that he needs a shave," said attorney Dan Paul, who lives five houses away. "I think he'll make a good neighbor."

Johnson's waterfront land is part of the 200,000-square- foot estate of the late laboratory owner and civic activist Willard Ware and his wife, Rhoda. The real estate agent who listed the property, Gerard Llorens, said Johnson paid close to a million for the land.

"It's his home," Llorens said. "It's going to be quite a place."

On one side, Johnson's neighbor will be Florence Hecht, owner of Flagler Dog Track; on the other, Rosalie Sholtz, the sister of former Florida governor David Sholtz. Other island notables include former Miami Dolphin Bob Kuechenberg and powerful lobbyist Steve Ross.

"He has filmed in my house and the one next door," said another neighbor, Gustavo Sanchez. "He's a good actor. He looks good."

Paul said the Johnson property now includes the Wares' greenhouse and garden service building. Mrs. Ware said she did not want to talk about the sale.

Sympathetic police officials "canceled" the citation. Then, after somebody posted a copy of the ticket on a bulletin board at the police station and somebody else tipped off the press, officials said it was all a mistake -- the ticket had not been canceled after all.

It all began early Tuesday. A four-door, hard-top Mercedes flashed past officer Randall Kugler, 23, at the Key Biscayne ramp to northbound I-95.

"He was going very fast, very, very fast," said Kugler. "It took me from Key Biscayne to State Road 112 to catch him."

"I'm with Miami Vice," Johnson said and showed him his California driver's license.

Kugler wrote the ticket.
[...]
Later, on the set, Johnson, 36, told Metro-Dade Cmdr. Nelson Oramos about the citation.

Oramos, technical adviser for the top-rated cop show, arranged to have the ticket "reviewed."

Cmdr. William Johnson said Friday, "We canceled it for him. We asked the officer to reconsider and the ticket was canceled."

The commander said the actor "has done a tremendous amount of community service. He's been with us through two Pig Bowls and a number of other charities, including Big Brothers and Big Sisters. It wasn't a situation where anyone's life was endangered. The guy's done everything a human being can do. Why is this such a big deal?"

Cmdr. Johnson denied the ticket had been fixed.

"I don't know what you mean by fixed," he said. "The ticket was canceled. We cancel tickets. We have a cancellation form. Fixing tickets is a whole different thing."

__________

Miami Herald, Oct. 16, 1987: Dear Sonny: Pleeease don't leave Miami

by Carl Hiaasen

Say it's not so. First it rains on the pope, then the Dolphins go on strike, and now this.

Don Johnson is so ticked off at Miami that he's decided not to live here anymore!

That's the heartbreaking news from a front-page interview in USA Today, wherein "the Miami charm machine" trashes the city fathers for their lack of gratitude toward the TV show.

"Since we came here, tourism has risen 12 to 15 percent," Johnson declared. "I think we are greatly responsible for giving a city that was in a great deal of trouble an identity and an image that it didn't have before. For that we've been maligned and abused in the press and misused by politicians and other special interest groups."

On the same note, a "disenchanted" Johnson disclosed that he sold his real estate on Star Island not because he stood to clear $590,000 on the deal. Rather, the real reason he sold the lot was because of the way the Miami Herald covered the Gary Hart story.

Miami Herald, May 3, 1987.

"I decided right then and there," Johnson said, "that I didn't want to live in a town where there was a newspaper that was that irresponsible. . . . I just found its tactics to be tabloid-esque."

Donna Rice

You can well imagine the thunderous effect of these remarks. All week long a funereal pall has hung over this newsroom, while high-level editors huddle morosely to figure out what to do.

Many of us were called in and brutally interrogated to find out if we were the ones who maligned and/or abused Don Johnson. We denied it vigorously, of course, since our necks were on the line.

Internally, the whole Gary Hart saga was reviewed, and the consensus emerged that we erred grievously by not checking first with Don Johnson before publishing such a big story. (The editor who committed this oversight was immediately garroted, and his parking privileges revoked.)

Later, some civic bigshots paid a somber visit to the newspaper and claimed it was all our fault that Johnson was moving back to Los Angeles. "Do something!" they cried. "Before tourism drops 12 to 15 percent!"

Some people whimpered that it might be too late. If we didn't shape up fast, they said, all the big celebrities in town might start selling their houses and moving out.

"We lose the Bee Gees, and your butt's in a sling," the bigshots warned.

Some of us were under the impression that Johnson was getting treated pretty well down here, but apparently more could be done to make him comfy -- say, closing the MacArthur Causeway at dusk, so the traffic won't keep him awake.

Others argued for something simple yet dramatic, like groveling at his feet.

Somebody offered to take out a full-page advertisement in Variety, apologizing to Johnson for whatever it was that we supposedly did, and begging him to stay.

I offered to sweeten the deal by promising to write nothing but wonderful things about his TV show -- particularly how brilliant and realistic the plots are. I also drafted a flattering review that began: "Move over, Olivier, here comes Donnie!"

Skeptics doubted if even this would be enough to keep him.

As an emergency measure, some top-level editors proposed a "Don Johnson Crisis Hot-Line" that would run straight from our newsroom to his trailer on the set of Miami Vice.

This way, all major news stories could be reviewed, edited and approved by Don himself before publication. If he were in the midst of shooting a scene, or flossing his teeth, we'd
gladly hold the presses until he was done.

I don't know if Johnson will like this plan, but we tabloid-esque types would do anything to make him stay.

After all, before Don came to town, the rest of America unfairly saw Miami as a violent, drug-riddled snake pit. Now, thanks to the TV show, it's seen as a violent, drug-riddled snake pit where everyone dresses snazzy.

"Miami Vice" star Don Johnson has kept the photographer waiting long enough. He finally descends from the top floor of his Beverly Hills Hotel bungalow and slips into a brocaded armchair, his shirt open to the waist.

He has a few ideas of his own about how this photo session should proceed. "What lens are you using?" he demands. Then, a bit later, refusing a pose: "This is not a flattering angle. I've been in this business a long time, and I can usually tell what looks good."

Minutes into the session, Johnson declares that he's had enough and walks out. Just like that, the session is over. "These pictures always look lousy in the newspaper anyways," he calls over his shoulder as he moves back up the steps.

Welcome to the tempestuous world of Don Johnson, where cool telegenic charm can disappear into a black hole of celebrity hauteur faster than a speedboat in the Miami night. Johnson's temper is already legendary in the Florida city that loaned its name to his stylish cop series. He stormed out of Miami last year after publicly blasting its press and city leaders. Both, he told USA Today last year, were guilty of "maligning" and "misusing" "Miami Vice" and its stars--even though, he added, the show had boosted tourism to Miami by "12 to 15%."

Johnson said in the same interview that he decided to sell his $1.4-million Star Island estate and move back to Los Angeles after learning about the Miami Herald's "tabloid-esque" tactics in uncovering Gary Hart's entanglement with model Donna Rice. (That comment prompted the Herald to print a tongue-in-cheek response, acknowledging that the paper's editors had erred grievously by not checking with Johnson first before running such an important story.)

Johnson's furor with Miami--and its local press--had been mounting for some time. Not content to stop at dutifully reprinting Johnson's favorite dessert recipe (pistachio souffle) or his taste in women (he prefers a sense of humor), the Herald provided extensive coverage of his life in Miami.

There's not a lot of love lost between Miami and Don Johnson, but then maybe it doesn't matter much anymore. Johnson has confided to associates that he would not be heartbroken if this was the last season for "Miami Vice"--which has dropped from the ninth most popular show during its second season to No. 45 last season. As the series begins its fifth season, which debuts Nov. 4, Miami may not have Don Johnson to kick around any more.

But Yerkovich was onto something when he suggested the Miami drug trade as a subject for a TV drama. In a 1984 interview with The New York Times, Yerkovich said he was drawn to this city that “used to be a middle-class vacation land,” and intended to explore what it had become instead: a criminal kingdom. In Billy Corben’s 2006 documentary Cocaine Cowboys, Miami Herald crime reporter Edna Buchanan claimed that at one point in the ’80s, an entire Miami police academy graduating class ended up dead or in jail. And a local police scientist in Cocaine Cowboys estimated that any random $20 bill plucked from a Miami wallet in 1981 would’ve revealed traces of cocaine. Clearly, Yerkovich had found the perfect setting for an ’80s cop show.

What was your first impression of Miami? Had you spent much time there?

I'd been there a few times with the Allman Brothers Band, recording at Criteria Studio. I'd passed through. It started to change dramatically in the early Eighties. The drug flow was just insane — thus the creation of the show. When I got off the plane to do the pilot, you could feel the pressure cooker of violence in the air. We were shooting the pilot in a house down in Liberty City/Overtown. And the [1983] Miami riots broke out. We had to shut down production because they were afraid for our lives. It was one of those cases where, "Well, we ain't in Kansas no more." But it was rich and raw. The whole city was just dilapidated, and it was during that time where there was a huge transition from the old white establishment to the influx of Cubans and Hispanics. That was a gigantic factor that contributed to the riots and unrest.

Had you seen Scarface? Did that prepare you for the role?

I had. Scarface in a lot of ways was larger than life and cartoonish. That's not to say that it wasn't like that, because it was like that. The guys running the drugs were coming from war-torn countries, and getting shot at was no big deal for them. Getting shot at, and having due process and actual laws that actually worked in their favor in some ways — you know, "You can't pin it on me if I'm not there with the stuff," blah blah blah — this was like a holiday.

I remember being out at this nightclub in Coconut Grove, called Cats. I got a couple of nice looking ladies with me, and in the next booth over was a guy I got to know pretty well, a big weight mover, and he had eight gorgeous girls sitting with him. At some point, I'm standing at [a] urinal and this guy stands next to me and he says [affects Miami accent] "Hey man, you that actor that plays that guy on TV, you guys are so cool." And he reaches in his pocket and pulled out a baggie that would choke an elephant, full of the best looking blow I've ever seen, and says "I want you to have this, man." Then he yanked it back real quick and said "Whoa, whoa… you're not what you are on TV, ain't ya?" And I said, "No, I'm not a cop but I'm not using, thanks but no thanks." And that was the truth — I was clean and sober the entire time during Miami Vice.
[...]
Returning to Miami all these years later, what changes struck you?

When we were there, it was all retirement apartments that were dilapidated and rundown. We painted the facades of virtually every building up and down Collins Avenue and Ocean Avenue to match the color palettes that we had for the show. At the time, there were no cool people down there. When I was on The Carson Show with David Brenner, he joked: "Miami? What are you doing in Miami? I thought that's where old Jewish women went to have Cuban children?" He accurately described it. If you shot a cannon off at South Beach, you would have hit maybe a blue heron and a Marielito.

What would you say is Miami Vice's most lasting impact?

The whole town kind of reinvented itself in the image of a television show. [Plus] you can't turn on TV without seeing some influence from Miami Vice, be it the music, the cinematography, whatever.

Friday, January 08, 2016

The Miss Universe Pageant enjoyed a long 12-year run in Miami Beach from 1960 to 1971. In 1970, the city's Tourist Development Authority persuaded the pageant's TV announcer to call Miami Beach "the land of sun, sand and surf."

But in 1972, the pageant moved to Puerto Rico and didn't return to South Florida until 1984 when, history tells us, a minor scandal erupted over whether or not Miss Germany, Brigitte Berx, had had a cosmetic procedure done on her boobs.

"Girls are fuller-busted than they used to be and we are adjusting swimsuits of the contestants accordingly," said June Wiley, who saw to it that the queens from 44 nations were fitted.

For the first time in the 19 year history of the Miss Universe pageant, Miss Wiley reported, a special swimsuit was made to fit a contestant.

Miss Wiley sent a rush order to her firm, Catalina Inc., in Los Angeles for a suit to fit bosomy Miss Czechoslovakia, Kristina Hanzalova.

"She has a 39-inch bust and a slender back," Miss Wylie explained.

Miss Czechoslovakia who said she had never before seen an ocean, splashed in the Atlantic Monday, happy with her new swimsuit. Her measurements are 39-23-35.

But Ediger's report was tame compared to a caption attached to a photo of Hanzalova sent out by United Press International.

CHESTY CZECH — Miami Beach, Florida — Kristina Hanzalova, 21-year-old Miss Czechoslovakia, literally threw newsmen for a loop when she replied “94-58-90” when asked about her vital statistics. She was referring to centimeters,of course, not inches to which the boys are accustomed. Kristina is one of the competitors in the Miss Universe contest being held in Miami Beach.(UPI Photo) 7/7/70 [via]

A 10-year-old girl received an "uncomfortable" TSA screening at a North Carolina airport after security officials found a juice pouch in her carry-on, according to her father.
Kevin Payne, of San Diego, says his daughter Vendela was meticulously patted down by a TSA agent for nearly two minutes after mistakenly leaving a Capri Sun drink in her bag at Raleigh-Durham International Airport. Payne recorded the pat-down with his cell phone.
"She just had a completely blank stare on her face," he told TODAY. "I could tell it was very uncomfortable for her."

Hating on selfies is even trendier and more irritating than people taking selfies. Why does anybody care about what photos other people take? SO many more irritating things on social media.

I responded by writing that in the many decades that I've been shooting pictures, it's never once occurred to me to take a picture of myself. "I found more interesting things going on around me than my own face," I wrote.

There are many reasons why I despise selfies.

Number one on the list: 99% of selfies are examples of really bad photography. Life is too short to be taking bad pictures, or worse, looking at them.

Number two: it's next to impossible to take a selfie without making yourself look like a complete idiot, or at the very least, a self-absorbed, narcissistic moron. So why would you?

Need proof?

But my Facebook friend was right about one thing: There are indeed "SO many more irritating things on social media."